Bucha, Ukraine - 27 Feb 2022 - 15mm

Good afternoon, OTT/Beasts of War:

Okay, with the Darkstar rulebook v1 finally complete, I can start turning my attention back to some other wargaming projects, threads, and campaigns.  First among these is the ongoing games of Arab-Israeli Wars between myself and @damon .  We had the beginnings of a rather large game some time ago, I wanted to post just a little of a battle report to show that with 2019 now underway, I fully intend and hope to get back to on-line wargaming with members in the community on a fairly regular basis.

So this is a scenario from the first hours of the ground operations, 5 June 1967, opening day of the Six Day War.  I have the Egyptians and Palestinians on defense, Damon has the Israelis on attack.  I have the “meat” middle of the Egyptian 7^th Infantry Division (9^th Brigade), holding the “neck” of the Gaza Strip, where it attaches to the main body of the Egyptian Sinai near the towns of Khan Yunis in the east and Rafah in the west.

On my left, centered in the Palestinian city of Khan Yunis, I have the 108^th Brigade of the 20^th PLA Division (Palestinian Liberation Army).  Note the dug-in T-34/85s (+1 defense, movement of zero), along with “Militia” infantry platoons, recoiless rifle batteries, antitank guns, blocks, minefields, etc.

On my right, sitting in Rafah on the roads that actually lead into the Egyptian Sinai proper, I have 47^th AT Regiment (SU-100s tank destroyers), and 1^st Heavy Tank Brigade (JS-3 battle tanks), with the main  body of 9^th Brigade/7^th Infantry holding the two wings together.  I have Soviet 120mm mortars, 82mm mortars at battalion level, and 122mm howitzers hiding up by the coast.

It’s a pretty serious force.  In all I have 68 counters on the map initially (a further brigade of T-55s arrives as reinforcements on Turn 4 historically this is the 14^th Armored Brigade).  So we’re looking at around 3000 men and 150 tanks and AFVs.

Each counter is a platoon of 5 vehicles, battery of 6 guns, or platoon of 45 infantry or so.  In all the map is 8 kilometers across and about five kilometers deep.

The Israelis will be coming in from the southeast.  Their objectives will  be to take at least four of the seven objectives hexes (highlighted yellow).  The idea here is to take the majority of the road junctions, and thus cut off the Palestinian forces in the Gaza Strip (extending northeast) from the bulk of Egyptian forces in the Sinai (west and southwest) – and open the major routes leading to the west (through Rafah, off the table, and eventually leading to the Jeradi Pass, El Arish, Port Said, and the Suez Canal).

The Egyptian right wing, centered on Rafah.  You can see the Josef Stalin 3s of 1^st Heavy Tank Brigade and SU-100 tank destroyers of 47^th AT Regiment.  There’s also some infantry platoons (each piece is a platoon of 45 men or so), a couple batteries of 85mm antitank guns, mortars, both battalion 82mm mortars and brigade 120mm mortars.

The Egyptian center, built around the main body of 9^th Brigade / 7^th Infantry Division.  At top you can see two of my D-30 howitzer batteries (122 mm). I’m hoping to use some of these to pin down the Israeli paratroopers as they enter the board in their halftracks.

Me left wing, centered on 108^th Brigade / 20^th PLA Division in Khan Yunis (eastern third of the board).  Note the T-34/85 tanks dug into the earth.  The Militia platoons here have lower values than my Egyptian regulars further to the west.  They also have 107mm recoilless rifles instead of dedicated antitank guns, no heavy artillery, and definitely not mobile tanks or reinforcements (unlike elements of Egyptian 7^th Division to the west).  This is definitely the “soggy” part of the Egyptian-Palestinian defense, I can really only hope to bog down Israeli tanks and paratroopers in all these urban hexes.